Friday Fictioneers – Gravity

Henry’s life was dominated by a sudden whim that had crossed his mind age 14. In 1965 he conceived the dream of becoming the centre of his own planetary system with tiny objects orbiting him.

A single hydrogen atom would do! But Henry needed to isolate himself from everything perturbing his gravity. He eschewed friends and moved to a tent in the woods, but still the earth’s mass tugged at the nearby stuff.

Last Friday, he hurled himself in free-fall from the cliff, releasing a nail clipping. As he dropped, he calculated the clipping would take 21 hours to circumnavigate him.

Friday fictioneers is a weekly challenge set by Rochelle Wisoff Fields to write a 100-word story in response to a photo prompt. You can find other stories here.

This is really interesting. A great character piece from inside the mind of a skewed individual. I could see this character being expanded in a longer story – if you feel like rescuing him from death that is 🙂

He’s certainly not alone in believing himself to be centre and master of his own universe. At least Henry’s experiment didn’t involve any other inhabitants of his planet. And I suspect the nail clipping fared somewhat better than its owner!